This invention relates generally to properties, methods and events available in software component architectures, and more particularly to coalescing such properties, methods and events between different such architectures.
Software component architectures have become an increasingly popular manner by which developers develop computer programs. Software components may be reusable, such that developers do not have to rewrite code to provide for functionality that is already provided by a given software component. Common software component architectures include those available within the Java programming language, such as JavaBeans and other Java objects, as well as Microsoft""s Component Object Model (COM).
A software component typically has outside interfaces that allow interconnection with other software components, and inside code that effectuates or implements these interfaces. The inside code is not usually accessible to other components. The outside interfaces may come in three different types: properties, methods and events. The occurrence of an event, which may be generally defined as a condition, causes the execution of a method. A method, which has one or more properties that may be generally defined as parameters of the method, may be generally defined as a sequence of code that provides for a desired functionality.
A disadvantage to software developers is, however, that software components written in accordance with one architecture, such as COM, may not usually be used in accordance with another, such as Java. This means that even if the developer finds a component that he or she desires to use, if the component is operative within a different architecture, the component is generally unusable. For these and other reasons, there is a need for the present invention.
The above-mentioned shortcomings, disadvantages and problems are addressed by the present invention, which will be understood by reading and studying the following specification. One aspect of the invention is a computerized system having an ActiveX control, a Java object, and an engine. The engine, which may be a computer program running on a computer, converts types of the ActiveX control to corresponding types of the Java object. In different embodiments of the invention, the engine may be compile-time or run-time.
At least some embodiments of the invention provides for advantages over the prior art. For example, ActiveX controls, which are a type of object within the Component Object Model (COM), may be utilized within a Java environment via at least some embodiments of the invention. Thus, the Java programmer is not limited to utilizing only Java objects such as JavaBeans in developing programs, but may also resort to COM objects such as ActiveX controls. Such embodiments of the invention provide for such coalescing of types from ActiveX controls to Java at both compile-time and run-time.
The present invention includes computerized systems, computers, and computer-readable media of varying scope. In addition to the aspects and advantages of the present invention described in this summary, further aspects and advantages of the invention will become apparent by reference to the drawings and by reading the detailed description that follows.